Yes for battle suit, of course.
I’m open for all buffs. I want to see more cards played and more opportunities to build a strong deck. If too strong after playing, just remove it again.
But I will not be able to join the summer tournament.
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I’m also thinking very similar to Dreamfire here.
Can we get a little more rationale behind the opposition to The Boot buffs? I understand the desire not to shake things up too hard, but I don’t know how the “or an upgrade” + Troq buffs make bashing viable. I feel like a stronger buff is warranted. CMV I want to know why I’m wrong
Would we be willing to quick test Battle Suits changes? I feel strongly they are warranted but again am wide open to being wrong. I’m concerned not addressing it devolves into PPA or FPN becoming dominant meta. Start a thread w/ me for whatever matchup you wanna try with it, I’m game to play with the Suits change or against it on any deck
My opposition: too much too quickly.
We don’t know how strong it will be in practice. I’m open to it down the road, after testing.
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In addition to what Bomber said, to me, these changes to The Boot don’t feel like a balance change, they feel like a new card. All the other changes we’re discussing are much more transparent about where they’re coming from.
I also don’t like the Swiss Army Knife approach in the changes to The Boot. In fact, it feels kinda antithetical to the way the game is played? It’s an answer to anything, there’s no opportunity cost in teching it.
Compare it to any other upgrade removal (including the card which literally has “versatile” in its name). If you tech them and your opponent never plays an upgrade, you wasted a tech. You got Yomi’d. Just adding “or an upgrade” to The Boot makes it a safer tech than all of these. Adding hero hate on top of that? Absolute overkill.
(By the way, letting The Boot destroy upgrades is a stealth nerf to other upgrade hate, which are already getting stealth nerfed by the changes to MoLaC and Battle Suits. I’m guessing this is the sort of thing Bomber is warning against)
I disagree with this statement; the use cases for weanie unit or hero hate on it are unique and weak enough that it could easily be a dead draw, and at 4 gold cost + a tech choice, it’s a pretty big opportunity cost teching it. 4 gold + troq out is a big opportunity cost.
It doesn’t answer tech 2 or 3, it doesn’t answer buildings or ongoing spells, it doesn’t answer strong combat heroes so much like Grave or Cala or Vandy, and it’s expensive.
It is a Versatile Style type card in this form and doesn’t have versatile in the name, but the existence of Versatile Style IMO shows a little swiss army knife can be warranted in a spec. Bashing is the “little bit of everything but the bad version of it” spec, this fits tonally
I think it’s transparent enough where this comes from: Bashing is a trash spec in the base game. It’s still trash w/ the changes we proposed to Troq and the upgrade removal. Something needs appeal bringing Bashing to the table.
I don’t actually think it is much of a stealth nerf. It’s expensive for what it does
I will willingly concede, however, we haven’t had nearly enough playtesting to know if this is straight busted good, just kinda good, or still not enough to make bashing viable, and we don’t fully understand knock-on effects. That I agree with. I just don’t think it’s worth buffing bashing at all if we aren’t seriously looking at making it viable, and I don’t think the minor tweaks to troq or randomly adding upgrade removal to the existing The Boot get us near scratching viable
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Honestly, look at the 4 choices Versatile Style gives you, and then look at the 3 choices this version of The Boot gives you. You can play an entire game without any of the options on VS ever being relevant (hell, you can play an entire tournament like that). I can’t imagine a game where a player doesn’t have either a tech 1 unit or a levelled hero for you to Boot.
Yeah, I don’t see this at all. You don’t buff a card by raising its cost and giving it a completely different functionality. If you want to discuss changes to The Boot, IMO they should start out much more subtle, or at the very least more related to its original functionality.
Edit: here are a few buffed versions of The Boot which still retain its card identity, in decreasing order of subtlety:
- Sideline and destroy a tech 0 or tech I unit. (take away patrol bonuses from your opponent)
- Remove all attachments and runes from a tech 0 or tech I unit, then destroy it. (answer to Juggermox and Soul Stone)
- Destroy a unit that costs (4) or less. (lets you kill a bunch of tech II units and even a lone Liberty Gryphon, just like Deteriorate can)
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I think even with the changes no one will play Troq. And no one will play disease and no one will play law (maybe mouse)…
Maybe the person who is willing to play one of those specs is coming with a proposal which changes are needed. If Troq wins the tourney due to too strong changes, then they can still be adjusted afterwards. Just my perspective…
I think something needs to be done to make bashing more playable, so buffing torq himself and something else seems necessary. My original idea was to add ongoing spell/upgrade hate somewhere to give another hate option, since there are not actually that many in the game. As it is now it is a big fat Leatherman multi tool but it also cost you $200. It seems fair enough as is. I don’t know if these changes alone makes the spec playable but they seem fair enough so far.
I personally would prefer a cleaner buff to torq instead of the 3 small changes you’ve proposed, just from a simplicity perspective. Unless someone wants to update the codexcdb or something 
It will just be easier to have less total changes.
I think the first 2 buffs to the boot @Dreamfire mentioned are worth considering.
I’m wary of the version of the boot that costs 4 gold. Bashing is a defensive spec, with the Boot as an expensive spell to push tempo and/or discourage bigger units from the opponent. Making it more like surprise attack is interesting, but it’s not clearly thematic.
I lost my last game against [Bashing]/Balance/Necromancy, btw, because Final Smash works.
I’d rather not scroll around looking for the specifics of the buffs being discussed, as a point of order. I like many of dreamfire’s alternatives to The Boot. However, I’d like a much more direct change: The Boot costs 2g. It being 3g is just completely overkill. The only thing that is a good trade against is Twilight Baron. Literally every other thing is even or terrible. And it STILL cant hit nullcraft. To which I say “make it a burn spell instead.”
Thematically, Bashing is supposed to be the big strong spec, and Finesse the small fast spec. Finesse getting discord for weanie clearing seems a bit off in that theme. And discord can hit nullcraft! For one thing, Bashing doesn’t make any weanies, so why is this here? But leaving finesse alone, I agree Bashing needs more oomph.
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Discord’s primary intent is to let you attack without losing your attackers, not for killing weenies outright. It’s only in multicolour that the latter becomes important.
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I don’t think just moving The Boot to 2g really does enough for it as printed, but I could concede doing that as a simple tweak to start since I seem to be in a pretty overwhelming minority. I prefer that to leaving it on 3g and giving it upgrade hate that I don’t think would ever be really used.
Bashing still lacks a good identity IMO but perhaps Iron Man + Rhino can serve a Midbandori strategy well enough to make it at least niche pickable w/ the slight buffs to Troq and The Boot. Intimidate is also low key useful against T2s and Swift Strike
Bashing has an identity as a spec with fairly tough units that have a bit of everything. The problem is that’s an identity that doesn’t sit well with multicolour deck construction, where most people want a handful of fixed strategies going in. I’ve some fun mixing it with Garth for flexible fetch options, and Intimidation for a surprise early kill on a combat hero, but it’s very hard to come back from behind with it.
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At one point it was suggested intimidate should be -3/-1, I think?
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To nitpick, it can also be a good trade against anything buffed with Two Step or Spirit of the Panda, and potentially with Ferocity, Mythmaking or just a couple of runes.
Good point about it being a debuff though. Since Doom Grasp isn’t a debuff (just “spell”), The Boot shouldn’t be either.
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I recall that conversation as well. I’d be in favor of that Intimidate buff.
Nice call! I agree, it’d be cool for it to be a Nullcraft answer.
Updating the Final Proposal w/ latest seeming consensus (speak up if this list is still contested!)
| Nerfs | |
|---|---|
| Vandy | Remove resist 1 at midband |
| Garth | Reduce midband stats to 2/3 |
| MoLaC | If you have no units in play, remove all runes from this |
| Lich’s Bargain | Base dame increased from 4 to 6 |
| Pirate Gunship | Remove obliterate 2, increase cost to 7 |
| Deteriorate | Increase cost to 1 |
| Dark Pact | Increase cost to 1 |
| Bird’s Nest | Sacrifice birds when birds nest leaves play |
| Buffs | |
|---|---|
| Troq | Swap midband and maxband |
| Mid at 4 and max at 7 | |
| Let maxband target any building | |
| The Boot | Cost moves to 2, change from “Spell - Debuff” to “Spell” |
Still for further discussion, may need vote:
| Nerfs | |
|---|---|
| Battle Suits | Change to apply to "Purple Soldiers and Mystics |
| Buffs | |
|---|---|
| Intimidate | Change to “Give a Unit or Hero -3/-1” |
… Anything else?
How is there more consensus about this change to The Boot, which only you and zhav have mentioned, than about Battle Suits, which at least 4 other people have chimed in about? 
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Is it really necessary to increase gunship cost? I think it’s probably ok at 6 without the obliterate. I could be proven wrong, but I don’t want to gut the card entirely.
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I’m completely torn between bomber’s approach of “let’s do it step by step” and what quite some others suggested: “let’s try a lot out and change some back if we are proven wrong”
The current proposal obviously is way more within the range of the latter, but I just realized I’m fine with this approach. And if we commit to this approach, then I would vote for: do all the changes!
For gunship I’m up for both, with increased costs and without. I think it’s still an awesome tech 3 either way, it’s just not the game ending card anymore that it’s been before which is great.